First Schatzberg. Interesting attempt at bringing Resnais-style edits to a New Hollywood character study - went “ohhh” upon seeing this was from the Five Easy Pieces writer. Main issue is that you’re largely just watching a mentally unwell woman unravel in a way that doesn’t necessarily connote something deeper, but the fractured superficiality is suggestive of something. I get the sense this wasn’t typical for Schatzberg?
ETA: oh, a debut film. That explains a lot.
The stealth/camouflage sequence is very beautiful. Don’t know if this really provided me with any fresh new insights into the basic training process, but the intermittent glimpses of characterization are very good. That one suicidal cadet is a bleak figure.
Watched on 35mm. This really should have made Elizabeth Huddle a star. Roemer’s refusal to overclarify the relationships is kind of thrilling - I especially enjoy how there are only a few vague allusions to the type of cancer our lead has, and one of them involves a shock cut to her screaming in pain in a way that gives it away. An extremely difficult film that’s perhaps a little too dependent on the two leads behaving erratically, but it’s also unflinching and frightening.
Roemer should’ve gotten to make whatever he wanted. The four fiction films are all major.
I’ll use this space as an excuse for a partial transcription of P. Adams Sitney’s introduction, please feel free to add anything I missed in the comments:
“I don’t like this movie, I think it’s Harry Smith’s worst movie, I don’t like the restoration, and I’m only here because they’re paying me! And if you think that’s bad you should have known Harry Smith, who was the most abrasive and insulting person I’ve known living or dead! He made me…
